MOBILE, Ala. — It is undisputed that Kristian Dillon Holzaepfel had sexually explicit online chats with as many as 4 different undercover investigators, or that he drove to a Wendy’s restaurant in January, where he had agreed to meet 1 of them.

What is in dispute, and what a federal jury will have to decide, is Holzaepfel’s intent. Was he actively trying to entice a 14-year-old girl to have sex with him, as the prosecution contends? Or was he merely acting out a fantasy, as the defense maintains?

Assistant U.S. Attorney Sean Costello urged jurors during closing arguments today to use their common sense to conclude the former. He said transcripts of chats he had with what turned out to be an FBI agent demonstrate that the 32-year-old Saraland man was trying arrange sex.

Costello said it is unlikely Holzaepfel planned to have sex in the parking lot.

“He was there to make sure that the 14-year-old girl he was chatting with online was real,” he said. “He wanted to make sure he wasn’t walking into a an undercover operation.”

That is precisely what Holzaepfel found. Agents questioned him and then arrested him four months later.

Defense did not call witnesses

Defense attorney Art Powell, who rested his case today without calling a single witness, reminded jurors that his client told investigators that he did not have a sexual interest in children and would have driven away if he had seen his online chatting partner actually was a minor.

“He said repeatedly, “I had no intention of doing anything other than meeting someone,” Powell said. “He didn’t expect to see a minor. Or, he didn’t know what he’d see.”

Powell said the evidence shows that Holzaepfel pulled into the Wendy’s after buying a giant cookie at the mall for his mother-in-law’s birthday party. He parked for a few minutes and then started to drive away — without going inside the restaurant or knowing he was under surveillance.

Powell aid his client was merely acting out a fantasy online.

Costello ridiculed that: “The parking lot of the Wendy’s at Bel Air Mall is no fantasy land,” he said.

Costello also pointed to a transcript from an earlier chat Holzaepfel had with an undercover Saraland officer, in which the defendant indicated he was driving around the city looking for the girl’s house.

Holzaepfel also stands charged with possession of child pornography based on 700 images that a computer expert pulled from the defendant’s laptop. Powell said those images were in “unallocated” space and were inaccessible without special software.

Powell pointed to evidence that the computer analysis also showed the computer contained several lab reports from the Mobile County Health Department, for which the government’s expert acknowledged doing consulting work. Powell said the expert, Gus Dimitrelos, was the only person in the case with any connection to the Health Department.